Friday, March 17, 2006

Liberal Democrat - Because of immigration, there is no England

According to Newcastle Liberal Democrat councillor Peter Arnold, the other countries of these islands are homogenous, with their own cultures, and so merit national Parliaments. England, on the other hand, has too many immigrants to be considered a nation at all.

Let's have the full horror :

England needs no parliament

Sir: Mary Dejevsky is wrong ("Why we need an English parliament", 14 March). There is no need for an English parliament because there is no England.

Scotland, Wales and Ireland are fairly homogeneous nations, each with its own clearly defined character and culture. That is why devolution (or independence) has been quite successful in all three. In England, the picture is far more complex. There are millions of Scots, Welsh and Irish living in England. The overwhelming majority of non-white migrants also live in England, along with many hundreds of thousands of other Europeans and people from other parts of the world. England is the genuine mongrel nation, and I welcome that. This fact however, makes identity far more complex and difficult than in the other British nations.

For example, I regard myself first and foremost as a Northumbrian, then as British, and finally as European. Here in the north-east we only began to be part of the nation after 1603. Before that, the independent kingdoms of England and Scotland played havoc with the area, and used it (and abused us) for their own dynastic ends. I have no loyalty to England. For me, the British state has meaning and relevance precisely because it has little connection with a brutal past based on ignorance and exploitation.

The answer to the West Lothian question is the creation of a fully federal United Kingdom, based on Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and the regions of England. There would still be disparities of size, but these would be far less than a separate English parliament would create. The failure of the referendum in the North-east in 2004 doesn't invalidate the concept. Devolution is working in Scotland and Wales; and independence has given most of Ireland a new lease of life. We just need to expand that successful formula to the rest of the United Kingdom.

PETER ARNOLD

NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE

I wonder if Mr Arnold realises what he's saying. He seems to be pretty much in agreement with Nick Griffin that nationhood is based round race ("homogenous nations") and culture.

England has successfully integrated many races and cultures in the past - including my family on both sides - and my wife's family. Yet my children are English, despite my attempts to convert them to Welsh rugby. I think of Nasser Hussain as an Englishman - and does anyone want to say that Colin Charvis isn't Welsh ?

The problem today is twofold - the collapse of English cultural self-confidence (exemplified by Mr Arnold - how about "England is the genuine mongrel nation, and I welcome that" - followed by "I have no loyalty to England" ?) and immigration on a scale which defies integration. These two things are faces of the same coin, of course. A self-confident nation could integrate many more immigrants (most immigrants now do not integrate) - but a self-confident nation would not allow mass immigration.

It looks as if poor old England gets it from all sides. As I've noted before, they've had to put up wih the Scots and Welsh, with their tiny immigrant populations, telling the English what hideous racists they are. Now, not only are they racist for not loving their multicultural Nirvana enough, but it turns out they haven't got a country any more - because they've allowed too many Scots, Welsh and Irish - and others - in.

Does the Liberal Democrat leadership agree with their councillor's view - that a nation can't exist without racial purity ?

And will Labour (who, you'll remember, lost the English vote) use this idea as the strapline for the Balkanisation strategy of Regional Assemblies ?

"You need a Regional Assembly - because England doesn't exist"

PS - re-reading the letter, you can only be amazed that the Indie published it. Imagine a Tory arguing in the Telegraph that a nation was based on ethnic homogeneity. It would be all over the BBC before you could say 'John Townend'. It looks as if you can get away with this sort of stuff - if you're attacking England.

15 comments:

Dave
said...

Yes, disgusting.But what would also be an interesting question, does he still think mass-immigration is good? (being a Lib Dem I imagine thats a yes) If it is a yes, he is admitting he intends to finish off England as a nation.. by his own logic.

Laban, did you see the report mentioned a few days ago where Newcastle was described as hideously white?

Really - how many Welsh or Scots tell the English "how racist they are"? Face facts - it is English people who say these things. The Guardian, Independent and BBC is staffed overwhelmingly with English people, and it is these cultural 'leaders' who attack England.

Turn your fire on those who are responsible, not those who you wish were responsible.

I like the way he sets himself up as a spokesman for Northumbrian victimhood: “…played havoc with the area, and used it (and abused us) for their own dynastic ends.” and “…a brutal past based on ignorance and exploitation.”

But he then shows a clear contempt for the political will of those same Northumbrians: ”The failure of the referendum in the North-east in 2004 doesn't invalidate the concept.”

In other words a typical leftist power-seeker who wishes to ‘appropriate’ the people on the basis that he understands them better than they do themselves.

Well, the smug little bastard is going to have a tough summer - a couple of months from now most Geordie cars will be flying the flag of a non-existing nation.

OK I can accept the fact that we English are a bit of a mixed bunch. Indeed I can say there is a moderate dollop of Hibernian genes in the Remittance melange. But this disqualifies me from parliamentary representation, how?

In case this LibDem dickhead needs a concrete example, I cite the people who used too be classified as Cape Coloured in the old South Africa. These bods are a right mix being descended from Malay slaves, bushmen who couldn't run fast enough from the early Dutch settlers, blacks who couldn't run fast enough from any settlers, indentured indian labourers and the bloody eskimos for all I know. The fact is they were denied political rights along with the "pure bred" Africans up until 1994. Would this Geordie bleeding heart have the balls to walk into Athlone on a saturday night and tell the assembled skollies that they were to mixed up to be allowed to vote? I'd make a fortune running a book on how far he managed to get back towards Cape Town before he got a knife in the back.

Would he dare tell Trevor Emanuel (the South African Minister of Finance) that his franchise was revoked?

He may have a legitimate case for denying the English their own parliament (I can't think of one offhand, but let's be charitable), but using the disparate bloodlines of the people who call themselves English as an excuse is just about the most stupid and insulting argument he could have come up with.

I name him DICKHEAD, let's see if he has the guts to call me out for it.

By the way, if we can't have a national assembly because we are too mixed up genetically, how does he square that with his benevolence in giving us regional assemblies? If the English as a whole are simply too complicated a mix to sort out, surely the people of East Anglia, the Northwest or the Midlands are also just as mixed up and thus should not have representation either.

This goon doesn't just insult the English for their heritage, he insults our inteligence too.

I'm prepared to sponsor his ticket to SA to see if he has the guts to tell another mixed heritage people that they have no right to the franchise. It'll be cheap 'cos it will most definately only be a one way ticket. He can make his own arrangements for getting his carcase home.

The guy is being a good pro-EU Lib Dem. Regional Assemblies/Devolution have been an EU-driven agenda from the start. They match the European Union of the Regions geographic areas precisely, and EU funding (ie a percentage of our money being given back to us with strings attached) is allocated on precise Regional lines.

Hands up who knew that Prescott was a Euro MP in the early Seventies and was on the EU Committee that drew up the original Regional Maps and Plans which are now in force?

Don't let the anti-English bias this twat exhibits blind you to what is really and truly driving this agenda.

Just one small point, if England does not exist, why is the English football team in the world cup, why is England represented as a country in the Commonwealth Games and why is England allowed to take part in the Rugby Six Nation? I make that a country and a Nation.

I know Peter Arnold and know that he is first and foremost a "Northumbria Patriot" - he is involved with organisations like the Northumbrian Folk Language Society. Clearly his personal sense of identity puts Northumbrian regional identity ahead of Englishness. Most other people wouldn't see it the same way, but I know Yorkshire people, Cornish people etc who feel the same way.

I genuinely think his comments about a "mongrel nation" were meant to refer to England's historic composition as a mix of ancient Britons, Romans, Angles, Saxons, Danes, Jutes, Normans, whatever...

I think that people who perceive his remarks to be a racial reference to modern multi-cultural immigration are reading something into this that's really not there and I'm sure is not what he had in mind.

1111Has anyone been to Newcastle recently? Certainly no sense of Geordieness anymore. It's not PC, and the city has become so racially mixed in the last 10 years that it has more non English born residents than Birmingham, head for head and this is the council's own figures